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this post was submitted on 30 Aug 2023
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What we need to do is de-incentivize the commodification of housing entirely. Really make it unprofitable to deal in homes while passing the risk for your "investment" on to the people you're exploiting.
I'm talking about an outright ban on all corporations, foreign and domestic, from owning single family homes — corporations need offices, not homes, and shell corporations and LLCs don't even need those. Give a one year grace period, then tax all rental income collected from single-family homes at 100%. Maybe fine them each year too until they shape up.
I'm talking about regulating rental prices on short-term rentals, and capping the annual income allowed from short-term rental units to a value indexed against minimum wage (or preferably the area's living wage, determined not by any level of government itself but by valid third party organizations).
I'm talking an annual federal tax on properties not occupied full time by the owner or their immediate blood relative. Parent, sibling, or child. Something insane, maybe 400-800% of the home's property tax. Multiply it exponentially for each hoarded home. Throw in an exception for a second home if it's far enough from the first (people who own cottages aren't the problem, and shouldn't be penalised). But only for the second home — nobody needs two or three or four "vacation homes".
That's how we force land-rich boomers out of the housing "market" and get homes into the hands of people who need them, who should have a right to stable housing, who are currently being blocked from the market by vampiric land leeches.
Rental income is taxed at 100%, FYI.
I think carrot works better than stick. Instead of punishing everyone who made an investment, and spending god knows how much money to enforce it, just offer a one time capital gains exemption on any investment single family dwelling that has rental income for more than a year. But make that exemption dependent on the sale going to someone who doesn't already own a home. (No landlords scooping up extra properties) this puts sellers in connection with buyers and since the seller is getting a big payout they can do the extra leg work. I bet many of the properties get sold to existing tenants.
The government gets an easy cost effective way to free up supply, and it doesn't actually take money out of their pocket. (Just removes future tax income). Limit the program to no more than 3 years. Anyone who is a casual landlord will jump to get out. Boomers in retirement will jump at it as they will have owned these properties for years. This will free up supply in months, not years. Everyone I know who owns rentals that I discussed this with said they would sell if they could avoid capital gains.
That's my $0.02. FWIW
You've already lost me. They're the ones trying to treat homes as a commodity fit for investing. Investments carry risk. Passing the cost of that risk to tenants, or giving them a free pass because they're being forced to play by real rules instead of the rigged game they've been taking advantage of, doesn't sit well with me.
They made an investment that by its very nature exploits people. They should shoulder the consequences of that decision.
That's because you aren't interested in solving the problem. You just want to punish people that you think are evil. You would rather throw everyone you don't like under a bus than actually help the people that need help now. Which is the vibe I get from many people on this site. The problem with what your want to do is it will never happen. There is no support. My solution plays into the hands of those in control but still gets the job done.
At this point I think I'm with Singapore on land and housing being a publicly controlled good
As it stands now our housing market is just an inflation resistant bank for the wealthy
They just named the price they're willing to rent it at its entirely secondary to their goals and so it doesn't serve the housing market
This is simply not true. Most of the single family dwellings rentals are owned by regular people. If you think the average person can throw down on a $800,000 mortgage at 6% and pay $8000 a year in property tax plus other expenses just to hedge inflation, you are as delusional as most of the people I've run into on this site. Just do the simple math on how much rent you would have to charge to break even on a rental if you wanted to be a land lord tomorrow, then see if you could just sit on a $50,000 loss per year. Jesus. I'm about done with Lemmy. People here are dumb as shit
You think I'm under the impression that people buying homes today as rental investments are the problem? The problem isn't people trying to buy into the scam today, it's the people who bought into it 10, 15, 20 or more years ago, have owned multiple homes for years, make their living off the work and money of others, and go about their lives thinking they're good people as if they're anything more than parasites in need of excision.
But if you're going to start name-calling and denigrating anyone who disagrees with you as "dumb as shit", I question whether you're approaching the topic in good faith. I'm not going to engage with you further.
None of this was a personal attack and to take it as such might mean you need to reevaluate your feelings on the matter.
Pointing back to my original argument I stated that it was often a inflation resistant investment I'm not speaking of single family homes renting out their bottom half or whatever the case may be.
I'm speaking of those you buy up commercial property with no intent to ever do anything with it because the value of the land will vastly outpace the value of inflation.
I'm also speaking about landlords that own hundreds of properties. While someone in your position is becoming increasingly common it is not the majority in housing scarce areas. There are still a few individuals that own large swaths of land.
There are a lot of policy decisions that got us here. But more mixed zoning, more housing, less landlords has been proven time and time again to fix it and while I'm not sold entirely on the Singapore idea I will say that everyone in my generation is fucking sick and tired of people making excuses about what can't work while people are on the street dying
Housing is already controlled by a government body, both implicitly and explicitly. The only thing that holds up the housing situation as we know it is that government body – our collective willingness to recognize and abide by it. If we don't like it, we can change it on a whim. We are the government.
That's the question. Why not pick a house you like and move in, its owner be damned? The answer, I'm sure, is because you know the government will soon come and kick you out. By brutal force, if need be.
It takes people like you and me to bring that force. We are the government. If we don't like housing being a market, why are we bringing the force? It's certainly easier to do nothing.
Why not complain to them now, then?
This is actually a great idea.